Finance experts say the continued profits from Compuware’s mainframe business will be key to paying off the debt from the company’s $2.4-billion buyout.
A business plan based on giant mainframes might seem precarious and antiquated in today’s era of cloud computing and wearable devices. But industry experts note that predictions of an imminent Death of the Mainframe have been coming for decades and were always proven wrong.
Jason Bloomberg, president of Intellyx, an IT consulting firm, said mainframe computers are still heavily used in industries including banking, insurance, airlines and manufacturing and can be more reliable than putting data in the cloud. He declined to speculate how long mainframes will stay in use.
“Y2K came about because people thought all of their mainframe code would be obsolete by the year 2000,” he said. “I don’t think anyone is willing to make that mistake again and predict the demise of the mainframe.”
